WYNDHAM Vale product Majak Daw is thriving with his new club North Melbourne.

Darren Crocker, North Melbourne’s senior assistant coach, said the first Sudanese-born AFL rookie was improving gradually and taking the media hype around him in his stride.

“Majak is going really well,” he said from the sidelines of Chirnside Park last Monday.

“He played in a game on the weekend and we were really pleased with some of the things he did and some of his efforts. He is coming along nicely.

“He is just thriving in the environment. He realised he has got a lot to learn, he has got to be like a sponge. In saying that we have been really pleased with how he has gone about things so far.”

The Kangaroos came to Werribee last week to train with the VFL club on the rain soaked Chirnside Park Oval.

It was the second visit in as many years to the ground as the club looks to build on its partial alignment with the Werribee Tigers.

“As a footy club we are pretty proud of the alignments that we have with Werribee and North Ballarat,” Crocker said.

“This is just another good opportunity to continue to build on that and also it’s good for our alignment with Werribee.

“The players all get to know one another and come together but it is also good for our supporters in the local area, to grow our supporter base down here, and expose them to our footy club.”

The Kangaroos went through a light session in preparation for their game against Sydney at Narrandera, NSW, played on Friday.

“It’s a good change-up (training at Chirnside Park) for us. As much as we have got a new fantastic facility at North, it’s good to mix up the environments you come to as a freshen-up as well.”

Crocker said the session gave new Roos recruits Daw, Jamie Macmillan and Matthew Scott a chance to build relationships with the Werribee players they might play alongside this season.

He also said the alignment was paying dividends already this preseason.

“There are a couple of guys who played a bit of footy with Werribee in the past, like Leigh Adams, who has been really impressive throughout the preseason.

“Goldy (Todd Goldstein) is another one who has come from the Werribee alignment and he has really stepped up and between him and Hamish (McIntosh) both had really strong contributions to games so far, both playing in the ruck and Goldy also able to go forward.

“Ben Ross played on the weekend (6 March) and he played in our first NAB Cup game. He comes from this alignment. He is going well and had a good preseason.”

Crocker said an injury to Alan Obit, who played 18 games in Werribee’s seniors in 2009 and two for the Roos, was disappointing.

“Obi is probably the one who is disappointing so far. He got a quad tear and he has been pretty slow with his recovery from that. He is probably still another month away so we are slowly bringing him back.

“He has missed a fair bit of the preseason so far so he might be behind the eight ball a bit but he holds his fitness well. He will get back into the fold pretty quickly.”